TOLEDO — The Detroit Tigers may have misplaced their offense someplace in the Pacific Time Zone, but they’re not going to find it sitting south of the Michigan-Ohio line.

Considering they scored just six runs in the final 55 innings of a disappointing West Coast swing, losing the final four games, it’s pretty obviously a trend they’d like to reverse in their upcoming nine-game home stand.

Just don’t expect that process will involve calling for reinforcements — not yet anyway.

As enamored as folks can get with can’t-miss prospects, there’s no reason to believe that anyone currently on the Triple-A Toledo roster can fix what ails the Tigers at the moment.

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It’s highly unlikely that the organization will suddenly reverse course on how they’d like to handle a guy like top prospect Nick Castellanos, clearly someone whose growth they don’t want to stunt by using him as a stop-gap solution.

And Castellanos still has things to work on in Toledo.

“Rarely do you ever see a 21-year-old platooning in the big leagues. They’d rather them play every day in the minor league level to develop,” Castellanos said last week, acknowledging he’d been on the same page with Tigers manager Jim Leyland when the team had decided not to make him part of any big-league platoon situation in left field, instead eventually going with journeyman Matt Tuiasosopo.

“Up there, what Jim said is when he told me I’m coming down here, he said when the rest of your game looks as comfortable as you do in the box, then you’ll be up here.

“Obviously at that time, I swung it really well in big league spring training, but when he’s talking about playing defense, running the bases, picking up signs from the coaches, just everything, being a complete baseball player. Because to get there is the easy part but to stay there is the hard part, and in order to stay there you can’t just hit well, you can’t just run the bases well, you’ve got to do everything well. I think they’ve said it time and time again, when I get there, they don’t want me to be a guy that goes up and down, they want me to stay there.

“So in order for that to happen, I have to do everything up to their expectations.”

Everything, not just one thing.

The one thing he can do extraordinarily well is hit.

Everyone knows that. It’s almost the sole reason Castellanos was ranked among the top 25 prospects in baseball (No. 21 by both Baseball America and MLB.com) heading into this season.

“Well, Nick is really at home in the batter’s box. He’s really, without question, at home in the batter’s box. He’s got some things to learn how to do yet,” Leyland said this spring.

“We really like him a lot. He’s got a chance to be something really special. But just learn to play the outfield, become a little more instinctive on the bases. He’s got that one important ingredient — he can hit — and that’s a big tool. That’s usually the one that speaks the loudest, but you’ve gotta work on the other things as well. And it’s not that he doesn’t, it’s just that hitting comes natural for him, and a couple other things haven’t, maybe. ...

“He’s at his best when he has that bat in his hand. ... He’s really a good looking young hitter. That’s just the way it is.

“And the best thing about that is, he knows he can hit. He knows he’s a hitter.”

At this point, though, Castellanos is a one-trick pony, and he’s still even got some work to do to iron out that one trick. He’s currently hitting .230 through the Mud Hens’ first 19 games.

Part of that is bad luck, hitting balls right on the screws, but right at defenders.

Part is playing in cold weather for just the second time in his career — something the native Miamian only experienced previously when playing for the Class A West Michigan Whitecaps.

And part of it is just getting used to a new level.

“It’s a jump. It’s the highest level I’ve played at. Guys are a lot better at their job, pitchers are a lot more consistent. Defense is a lot better. So it’s just another adjustment I have to make and it’s a level I’m going to have to get used to,” Castellanos said “It’s also getting used to the way guys pitch at certain levels. I’ve noticed here guys use a lot more off-speed pitches. Everything moves a little bit more, no one throws as hard as they do in the lower levels. Of course you have your guys like their closer, who will come in for an inning or so and light up the radar gun, but for the most part everybody hits their spots, everybody’s moving balls.

“If you look back, the only level that really I didn’t need an adjustment period in the beginning was in Lakeland. West Michigan, I had a little bit of a slow start as I got used to everything, also in Erie. I had about 15 or so games where I wasn’t hitting too well and after you start getting used to your team, used to your surroundings and get comfortable in your lineup, then everything starts rolling. Sometimes you just need that one good game, then after that everything just keeps going.”

He’s also got other adjustments on his mind, like continuing to improve as an outfielder, a move he made in the final two months of last season, switching from third base.

For now, he’s a left fielder.

“He’s going to be play left field. He’ll stay out in left field unless they call down and tell me something different. I think that’s the best spot for him, at this point, within our organization — and for him, to be honest with you,” said Toledo manager Phil Nevin, who made a similar transition from third to outfield when he was traded to the Tigers in 1996.

“When you go out there, it’s a different kind of first-step quickness. At third base, it’s a different reaction (compared) to the outfield. When I made the move, the hardest thing for me was remaining focused. You can kind of get lost out there — and I know Nick’s personality. He shows a lot of the same qualities. And you can go out there, and just find yourself counting grass blades, and don’t get a ball hit to you for six innings.”

Castellanos concurred.

“It is. It’s easy to get distracted and it’s easy to think about your at-bats or whatever when you’re in the outfield, instead of focusing on the hitter because at third base if you’re not focusing on the hitter, you’re going to eat one. In the beginning, it was a little more difficult for me to keep my concentration but now it’s just becoming second nature, just because of the amount of games I’m playing out there,” he said.

“Hopefully in the future I want to get back to third base, but I know as long as Miguel’s there and Prince is over at first, those guys are going to play 160 days out of the year, so I got no business over there.”

There’s also the factor of simply getting used to a bigger body.

Castellanos has grown an inch, and put on 30 pounds of muscle since the Tigers drafted him in with their supplemental first round pick in 2010 out of Archbishop McCarthy High School in the Miami suburb of Southwest Ranches.

“A lot of people don’t understand, but it takes time for an athlete to get used to a bigger body, too. You’re 170 pounds, and all of a sudden, you’re 190, 195 pounds — that’s a big difference. You’re carrying more weight, you’re trying to keep your speed, your flexibility. You’re stronger, you’ve got more power, but you’ve gotta make sure you can keep everything else going, too,” Leyland said. “Sometimes, it takes time for that.”

So has it happened yet?

“He’s 20 years old, guys. He’s growing still. That’s just part of growing. And you’re going to see that. He’s going to be a big, physical guy,” Nevin said.

“You may not see the power right now, but if you’re a baseball person, and you’ve been out there, and seen players grow, it’s in my opinion, when I watch him, he’s going to be a home run hitter in the big leagues. He’s going to hit for average, but he’s going to hit home runs. He’s going to hit 25-30 home runs in the big leagues.

“That’s just my opinion.

“Is it going to happen now? It’s not going to happen now. And I don’t expect him to try to do it. I expect him to keep doing the same things he’s been doing. ... But right now, he’s fine where he’s at.”

Matthew B. Mowery covers the Tigers for Digital First Media. Email him at matt.mowery@oakpress.com and follow him on Twitter @matthewbmowery.